


becoming part infinity

by womanaction



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer (TV)
Genre: Gen, gay/bi xander, reader interpretation on that, season 4-early season 5, sexually questioning xander, unlike the writers i remember jesse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-16
Updated: 2019-08-16
Packaged: 2020-09-02 04:10:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,269
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20269795
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/womanaction/pseuds/womanaction
Summary: As long as Xander’s been Xander (there are blurry Polaroids labeled “Alex” stowed in some closet somewhere), he had known his parents’ love was far from unconditional.





	becoming part infinity

As long as Xander’s been Xander (there are blurry Polaroids labeled “Alex” stowed in some closet somewhere), he had known his parents’ love was far from unconditional.

The lines were carefully drawn with his father’s favorite phrase. “No kid of mine.” No kid of his would fail reading in first grade, dyslexia notwithstanding. Of course, no kid of his would be a try-hard brown-noser teacher’s pet, either. No kid of his would sit in the basement playing video games all day – and no kid of his would suck so utterly at every organized sport that he’d have no choice but to let the kid hide out of shame.

And absolutely no kid of his would demonstrate what he termed “funny business,” including but not limited to: wearing pastels, going shopping willingly, listening to anything but classic rock, having female friends without fucking them, or heaven forbid, getting into photography. Even Star Trek wasn’t safe – apparently, his father harbored some suspicions about the real nature of Kirk and Spock’s relationship.

As for his mother, well, most of the time her eyes slid over him like he was a familiar and not-particularly-loved piece of old furniture. It was like she was scared of what she might see. It was only sometimes, when his father was gone and she was three (or four, or five) sheets to the wind that her face would soften as she looked at him.

It never lasted.

* * *

Nearly as long as Xander’s been Xander, there’s been Willow-and-Xander.

The first time they’re alone together after the revelation about Tara, he couldn’t help but find his clothes suddenly fascinating. He had a hundred questions, a couple of dozens of which were acceptable to ask in polite company, but he had also apparently developed a horrible allergy to speaking.

Willow doesn’t shrink like she used to, but she does seem to shy away from his lack of gaze. Eventually, she must have mustered up some courage that was beyond him, venturing to say: “You don’t…?”

“No, no,” he said immediately, earnestly, never needing to hear the rest of her sentences. “Will. It’s wonderful. It’s you.”

“Okay,” she said back, obviously not quite believing him but willing to let it go. She sipped her coffee that he’d bought with his meager earnings.

He wanted to ask: _How did you know? What about Oz? Was there anyone else?_

All he managed to actually verbalize was: “Tara seems really cool.”

“Yeah, she is,” Willow responded, brightening immediately with that flushed, excited-Willow expression. “I’ve never met someone who really _feels _so much about magic – not just knowing, because I think Giles has that in the bag, but like an intuition-level? And she’s so _funny_, which I didn’t get at first at all, but when you get to know her – is this weird?”

“Huh?”

He was thinking about Anya, and how things could not be wrong and funny if there was Anya (and Cordelia before her, but his dad would say it doesn’t count if the cock stays dry; there was always Faith for that, but as confused as his feelings might have been, he was entirely willing to admit that Faith was _not_ really his type…) and now he needed to respond because Willow was looking at him like he was a crazy person. Or, more likely, a homophobe. “No! No. Not weird. Or, good-weird. Willow is happy, weird, which shouldn’t be weird but, you know, Sunnydale. Land of eternal suckiness.”

If Tara had come across all demon-y, that would almost be reassuring.

Willow gave him a Look. “You’re extra babbly.”

“Like a brook, I am,” he answered quickly.

The old Willow, Xander's Willow, might have pressed further. This Willow, this new, confident Willow, shrugged and kept talking.

* * *

If he’s honest with himself, as long as Xander’s been Xander, he’s known he’s a little different. Kind of funny, since he was now the only normal human in a band of weirdos who did magic and killed stuff with their bare hands. On the other hand, maybe that’s a sign of his weirdness: weird enough to fit in with the crowd of ex-demons and current-demons, no magic powers required.

He had tried to have more guy friends for a brief period in eighth grade, in some weird effort to appease his dad. Jesse, apparently, didn’t count – Jesse was apparently too ostentatious, too showy, too outsider. He’d stolen some of his dad’s Playboys, so he could slink and sleaze and objectify with the best of them, but it all seemed so empty and pointless and unnecessarily difficult. “Why not just talk to some girls?” he asked eventually, and was subsequently mocked and shunned for a few days.

He found he didn’t really miss his new friends. There was one, Ty, the new kid. He was mostly quiet, but he laughed at Xander’s jokes, the number one way to get him to like just about anybody. And he was funny in his own way too, sarcastic and understated. He transferred to private school the next year, and Xander’s new ex-friends transitioned into high school bullies.

* * *

He didn’t say anything (not that there was anything to say) to Buffy, or Willow, or Giles, or Anya, or heaven help him, even Spike.

Instead, some time, he was improbably alone with Tara.

Tara is so…quiet. And, boasts about liking the quiet aside, it kind of made him nervous. It was like she was listening to whatever he _wasn’t _saying, as she tucked a lock of hair behind her ear and did that little Tara half-smile. It’s cute, but in an unsettling way. Like people said about Anya, although at this point he barely noticed any of the unsettling things.

She knew he was watching her. He knew she knew he was watching her. She knew he knew…

Oh, screw it.

“How’d you know?” he has asked, words leaving his mouth before the thought is fully generated.

Tara, to her credit, did not start or shock in any way. The corner of her mouth went up just a little further.

“About Willow, you mean?”

“Yes! No. I mean, about…you.” God, this was bad. Brutal. His mouth should be torn off his face and thrown into the sea for badness of words like that.

But Tara only nodded, wisely, and closed her book. “I didn’t. I mean, I did, but then I didn’t again. It was a whole cycle type thing, and I thought that if I didn’t say anything then it wouldn’t be really real. It wasn’t until I got to Sunnydale…”

“That it got real,” he supplied.

There was a full smile now. “Yeah. Really, really real.”

“But surely there were…people, before?”

Tara shrugged. “Crushes, mostly. And one girlfriend.” She said the word almost hushed, and Xander tried to imagine her younger, still as timid as when he’d met her, but bold and rebellious enough to date someone right under her scummy father’s nose. “But…it was all secret. So still not the realest, when it was over.”

“Yeah,” he said, sort of understanding but not really.

Xander didn’t know what else to say.

“It’s okay to not know,” she volunteered suddenly, and he wondered for a second if she’d been reading his mind (plausibly witchy) before he realized what she meant. “O-or even to know and not say anything, or to say something and not really know yet. They’ll understand.”

* * *

Maybe Xander was still working on becoming Xander.

There was no mystical destiny dropped in his lap, no latent powers he discovered. Which meant, unfortunately, he had to do this himself.

He took a deep breath.

**Author's Note:**

> This inspired me to write more Xander/Jesse things so that may happen at some point.


End file.
